- Previously on Top Chef... We're going to Austin.
[Cheering]
- Ladies and gentlemen, miss Patti LaBelle.
- ♪ Ooh! Uh! ♪
- Oh, my God.
Is this really happening?
15 minutes!
- Down to the wire today.
- Rescue, rescue, rescue.
That's what I'm trying to do right now,
because I know my beef is not good.
- The cut of meat, I don't even know what it is.
- It's bigfoot. [Laughter]
- "It's bigfoot." - I did Wisconsin style.
This much on a plate, so--
- Sarah. - Oh, my God!
- You are the winner. - Thank you!
- Heather...
Please pack your knives and go.
- Bye--ee.
[Muffled talk]
- Honestly, I feel like Heather going home
is the best thing for me. [Laughs]
And I feel a personal satisfaction.
I'm sorry to say that.
- Nine chefs remain, all hoping to win
a feature in Food and Wine magazine,
a showcase at the annual food and wine classic in Aspen,
$125,000, furnished by Healthy Choice,
to bring their culinary dreams to life,
and the title of Top Chef.
♪ Top Chef: Texas 9x09 ♪ BBQ Pit Wars Original Air Date on January 4, 2012
== sync by elderman ==
- I can't believe Heather went home, dude.
- I know. She at least had the heart, you know?
She'd fight for it. [Laughs]
- [Laughs]
- It's getting hardcore now.
- Really, at what point do we stop helping each other?
- Soon. - What do you mean?
on my cake. - Genoise.
- That's your cake? - Oh, yeah.
- Are you kidding me?
You don't have the balls enough to say it to Heather's face
while she's here, then don't even say it at all.
If you [bleep] have the winning cake recipe,
then why the hell didn't you make it?
- She couldn't remember the ratio.
- It really shows that dark side to Edward that--
you can't trust him.
- What do you do?
You play to win.
[Knocking at the door]
- Hello. - Hey, come on in.
[Gasping] - What is it?
- No! - No way!
- Hey! - Wow.
Nice. - [Whistling]
- Modernist Cuisine by Nathan Myhrvold is, like,
a game-changer.
It's an incredible, encyclopedic set of books
about how to approach all of cuisine with a modern mind-set.
- "Hello, chefs, this is your homework.
"Study up. See you tomorrow.
Padma."
- Oh. - Nice!
[Whistling] - Wow.
- What are you even supposed to study in all this?
- Wow.
- Jonesy. - Not all of this
is molecular--
a lot of it is just classic techniques,
it's just everything's been studied.
- These are beautiful.
This book is a huge deal.
It's the most elite cookbook that's ever been written.
It's coveted by every chef across America.
I'm so excited to look through it.
I hope it's just a written test.
There's a blowtorch on-- - Yeah, "how not to use
a blowtorch." Oh, my God.
That's way too many graphs.
- I don't think there's any way you could possibly
absorb everything in those books in one night,
but I stay up late looking at them,
because I'm not gonna go down because I didn't try my best.
- We get to le Cordon Bleu,
and standing there is Padma and Nathan Myhrvold,
the author of Modernist Cuisine.
- Morning, chefs.
All: Good morning.
- I look up to Chef Nathan. He's a genius.
If I could be one tenth as smart as he is,
I might rule a small continent.
- For the quick-fire today,
we're going to explore the modernist in all of you.
- The modernist cuisine movement started in the mid-1990s,
and it's really about learning new techniques
to delight the people that eat your food.
Now, sometimes the techniques are based on science,
but molecular gastronomy is only a small subset
of the overall modernist movement.
Really, it's about creativity.
- The chef who best illustrates modernist cuisine
will win immunity...
And a coveted copy of Nathan's book.
[Applause, laughter]
- Modernist Cuisine was just published this year.
People have been hot to get their hands on these books,
and now I have a chance to win them.
- You have 45 minutes to cook, and your time starts now.
Good luck.
[Blender whirring] - Go, daddy, go. Go, daddy, go.
I haven't won a quick fire, and this is probably
my greatest opportunity to, because at Moto
my job is to find new ways to cook food.
You know, a lot of the techniques in this book
I've actually maybe done first.
♪ Give me that funky stuff, that funky stuff ♪
I'm doing a miracle berry taste.
A miracle berry actually changes the profile of your palate.
A super protein within them blocks the taste buds,
so that sour will then turn and taste sweet.
Whoo!
- Chris Jones' whole table is enshrouded in, like,
mist and smoke, and he kind of looks like the nutty Professor.
- Cold pot down the line.
Nitro cold! Nitro cold!
- But I'm gonna make something really simple.
A piece of watermelon with tapioca maltodextrine.
I take olive oil, mix it with the tapioca maltodextrine.
It becomes a powder, and when that powder hits your tongue,
it dissolves back into olive oil.
- [Growls]
- For me, if it has a practical purpose,
I use molectro gastron--
molecular gastronomic-- oh, I can't even--
I use some of those techniques.
I have the vial of maltodextrine.
It's right here. Here's one.
- [Gasps] Ooh, God.
Does somebody have lecithin?
Modernist cuisine is not my forte.
I'm gonna try to make caviar that's not caviar.
I'm making tarragon dill caviar.
That's pretty much the only thing I know how to do
that's magic. [Laughs]
I got it, I got it, I got it.
- [Bleep]!
- I made a dish recently using, like, a curry panacotta,
but I decide to use an isi,
which is kind of a modern thing to foam up my curry cream.
Uh, can I go?
- Yeah, hold on, please. - Okay, mm-hmm, yeah.
- Go ahead. You got to take it to your station.
- Okay. You done? - Yeah.
- I don't use too much of the new modern equipment,
but I'm trying to think how I'm going to be crafty,
so I take inspiration from breakfast
to make an egg yolk-filled raviolo
that makes you look at pasta in a new way.
- Don't try this at home, kids.
- Done? - All you.
- Thank you, sir.
I definitely think I'm a modern person.
I like to do modern art, and my apartment is modern style.
We're in my apartment. I just wanted to show you
some of what I do when I'm here, some of my artwork.
As you can notice, a lot of them are nude paintings.
That's definitely something I like to do.
Oh, that's hot.
My style of food is similar to the Modernist Cuisine books,
so I want to do, you know,
a little spin on a scallop with risotto.
I just want to change the texture of the risotto,
make it really airy and light and fluffy.
- You have five minutes.
- Coming through, guys!
- Holy crap, that time goes fast.
- Come on, cold!
- Behind, sorry.
- Time is up.
Hands up, utensils down.
- [Laughs]
- And I'm looking around the room,
and I see some beautiful plates, but I really feel like
this is the winner. I came here to do my style,
and this is my style.
At least put me in the top. For the love of Pete,
put me in the top.
- Hi, Beverly. - Nice to meet you.
I used a curry whipped cream with mango chili,
and I flash-steamed the clams and the mussels.
- Cool. - Thank you.
- Foam away.
- I'm sorry. - [Laughs]
- Okay. That's a very modernist thing, actually.
We're not used to having the food served on us.
- [Laughs]
- Okay. - Sorry.
[Clatter]
- [Laughs]
- You want to just wipe off for a second while she cleans up?
- [Laughs] - I respect Beverly as a chef.
I respect Beverly as a person.
- [Gasps] [Laughs]
- Is she an oddball? Yeah.
- That looks delicious.
- This is Texas barbecue.
- How am I supposed to make barbecue that's this good?
- Hey, who's got the foil brisket?
- They're on the ground.
- What the [bleep]?
- It helps if this little thing is screwed on.
- Yeah. - And usually
if you take this off, it gives you more room.
- [Laughs] Thank you. [Laughs]
Putting the foam on, it went all over Padma's dress.
It really embarrasses me.
I came up in a very strict family,
wasn't able to, like, sleep over and do normal things,
go out to parties, so I'm socially awkward,
because I only focused on my work.
- Okay.
- This way.
- I took the idea of the breakfast raviolo.
The sauce is made with orange juice, and it's with bacon,
and then there's an egg yolk in the center of the pasta.
- Pasta in general is a very high-technique food.
Ravioli's don't grow on trees. - [Laughs] No.
Thank you so much.
- I did a play on Sushi.
You actually have salmon belly sashimi.
I compressed watermelon.
The rice actually three different kinds or radish
held together with a coconut fluid gel.
- Thank you. - Cool.
- I have trout sashimi, dill caviar,
pickled watermelon rind, and radish.
- How did you do the caviar?
- I put oil in the freezer, and then squirted gelatin
into the cold oil.
- Oh, that's one of the ways you can do it.
- It's the only way I know how,
[laughing] So--
- I kind of embrace modernist cuisine
by really simplifying it down.
And what this is is watermelon, vanilla bean honey,
cracked black pepper, and olive oil powder
with a little bit of maldon salt.
- Thank you. - Thank you very much.
- I did a little bit of marinated baby octopus
and tempura sea beans with togarashi.
- Very refreshing, thank you.
- Thank you. - Yes.
- I just wanted to do a play on risotto with scallops.
The risotto is actually the foam.
- Mm-hmm. - And then a little fried caper,
and the raisins are imitating capers, as well.
- Terrific.
- Nathan and Padma seemed to enjoy my dish.
I feel like it embodies the challenge.
I'm feeling really good.
- There's a soubise, so you get the sweetness of the onion.
I cut endive a few different ways,
so you get different kinds of textures,
and you have a little bit of richness from the egg yolk,
and there's a parmesan and truffle powder.
- How is the egg cooked? - Uh,
I just steamed it in a combi,
but in a different shape.
- Okay, thank you. - Great.
- Hi. - Chef,
it is absolutely wonderful to meet you.
I'm very excited about this.
- Mm-hmm. - [Laughs]
- The first thing that I'm gonna ask you to do
is take the red pill.
Now this is actually a miracle berry in a tablet form,
and what this is gonna do is, it's gonna change your palate.
- What do you mean? - I grow it in my basement.
- Oh, you do? - Yeah.
- Excellent. I would love to visit your basement.
[Laughter]
So the first thing I'm gonna have you try
is the lemon.
- Mm-hmm. - That's incredible.
It tastes like the most intense tangerine.
- Mm-hmm. - The next thing
is a deconstructed cheesecake.
BlackBerry droops, which I actually used liquid nitrogen
to shatter and break apart,
and basically you're gonna have a very sweet cheesecake.
The last thing that I have over here
is going to be sparkling water, lime and lemon.
The first sugar-free soda.
It doesn't have any artificial sweeteners.
- You just have to suck on the right pill first.
- You do.
- Chris "J's" miracle berry,
I don't think there's like any technique involved in it.
It's kind of gimmicky.
- How did they do, embracing modernist cuisine?
- Overall it was a very good effort.
- Who missed the mark?
- Paul.
You had a dish that had very interesting textures,
but it wasn't enough depth of flavor.
- Beverly.
To make your seafood really stand out,
you've got to do something that makes it very different,
and the foam and a couple of the other things you did
were in that direction,
but I don't think they were far enough.
- And, Grayson,
your dish was a very simple preparation,
but if you have something very simple,
the elements better be great.
- Who broke the rules in a good way today?
- Ty, having that set of spices was interesting.
The use of the maltodextrine to make a powder
was also an interesting way of delivering the olive oil,
so I thought that was a very successful dish.
- Thank you.
- Sarah.
You know, you did a really good job of taking something
that a lot of Italian grandmothers couldn't make,
and yet, if you put it in the right context,
it works.
- Who else was a favorite?
- Chris "J,"
I thought it was very nicely staged,
going from the lemon there to then the composed dessert,
and then the soda, so it was a hell of a dish.
- Thank you. Thank you so very much.
- Nathan, who is the winner of the quick fire?
- The chef who really shows a combination of creativity
and execution is...
- Ty. - Yes!
[Applause]
- Congratulations.
- Congratulations, Ty. You win immunity in the next challenge
and your very own copy
of the much-coveted Modernist Cuisine cookbook.
[Applause]
- Well done.
- I'm really excited to have won the books
by cooking something for the author,
and immunity is great.
I've definitely been at the judges table
way too many times in this competition.
- For your elimination challenge,
we're moving from the modern to the traditional.
I'm talking about the most traditional food in Texas...
- [Gasps] - Barbecue.
- Yes! [Cheers and applause]
- Woohoo! [Laughs]
I am so excited that it's barbecue.
I love to grill.
This is the challenge I've been looking forward to.
- Nathan took first place in the world barbecue championships
in Memphis, Tennessee.
- Oh, God. - What can't this guy do?
Everything he touches he becomes an expert at.
Nathan's like this weird renaissance man
that's been dropped in from outer space.
- Chefs, please split yourselves into three teams of three.
I definitely don't want to work with Beverly.
After the past two group challenges
the downfall of the team has always been based on her.
- Us three? - Yeah.
- All right. - Is that cool?
- That's fine. - Okay.
- I definitely don't trust Ed, but I know that
Tyler talks a big game when it comes to barbecue,
so I certainly want to work with him on this challenge.
- Paul, I'm gonna be with you. - Cool. Us three.
- Chris's? All right, let's do it.
- The groups just formed really quickly,
and I was kind of standing there like, "oh, [bleep]."
It was kind of like we were the three left.
- You'll be serving barbecue to over 300 guests
at one of the best barbecue joint in Texas, the Salt Lick.
- Oh, my God.
The Salt Lick is known
for having the best barbecue in Texas.
My fiance Jaimie's gonna be very jealous,
'cause that's all he talks about.
We've been together for about five years now,
and he's a chef also.
I want to win this for him.
- We all know that good barbecue
requires hours of smoking on the grill,
so for this challenge you'll have all night to cook,
up until service at the Salt Lick tomorrow.
- We want it see three different kinds of meat,
chicken, beef brisket, and pork spareribs.
All three of those should go on a plate tomorrow with two sides.
- Oh. - Oh, whoa.
- Three different kinds of meat,
two sides for 300 hungry people.
You can take elegance and throw it out the window.
This is gonna be a real slam-a jam-a barbecue.
- Tonight you'll go to the Salt Lick
and meet with the owner, Scott Roberts.
He'll share the secrets of his delicious food there,
where his family's been barbecuing for over 100 years.
Each team will have $1,000 at Whole Foods
and $1,000 at Restaurant Depot.
- Have fun, and I'll see you tomorrow.
- Thank you. - Thank you.
- Paul, get three carts.
- It's great to be on another challenge with Ed.
Ever since we won the game meat challenge,
we've really come together and I feel really confident
about how we're gonna fare.
You want a whole black peppercorn?
- Flower of the ocean? - Yeah, let's do it.
I'm very happy to be working with Chris
and Beverly's a very strong cook.
Let's knock it out of the ballpark.
First thing that comes to mind for us
is coleslaw and baked beans.
We really want to do a basic Texas barbecue.
- Apple cider vinegar, beer, beans, liquid smoke.
- Sugar.
- If we didn't go safe, we'd be better off.
- Yeah, we'd win, right? - Yeah.
- The other two teams are both doing beans
and they're both doing coleslaw,
which I think is too literal.
So my idea is to use a lot of miso, curry,
and vietnamese fish sauce.
We're using a lot of Asian ingredients,
but at the same time, when you eat it,
it's gonna taste like barbecue.
Oh, I'm stuck.
- And we're gonna get lemons over yonder, right?
- Yup. Sarah's Texas accent
is getting thicker by the minute.
The first couple of weeks,
she was like, "Oh, I'm Chicago, I'm Chicago, I'm Chicago."
Now it's like, "Oh, I'm Texas, I'm Texas, I'm Texas."
You know, whatever. It's annoying.
- What y'all doing with all that beer?
Ed, you don't need these raisins?
- No, we already have some. - I do need the raisins.
- 11 cents under.
- Now it's on to restaurant depot to get all of our meat.
- All right, Grayson, okay.
I've the Dr. Pepper barbecue sauce before,
and we're in Texas, the birthplace of Dr. Pepper,
so I think it'll be a big hit.
Chris, watch, that Dr. Pepper might fall off.
I'm gonna get the other cart.
- [Laughs]
I'm going nuts.
Okay, I'm not gonna get any of these.
We buy about 60 whole chickens, 15 whole briskets,
this is pretty ridiculous.
We have a lot of protein to cook.
All right, ready?
- Ready. - Great.
- Ginger? Can we get some ginger?
- Thank you. - Have a good day.
- Nice. - That's power shopping
right there. - That's power shopping.
- Leaving Restaurant Depot, heading to the Salt Lick,
I think we're all nervous about what lies ahead of us,
and the night that we're gonna have doing all this barbecue.
- In front of these barbecue pits all night
it feels like we're sitting on the surface of the sun.
- My heart's racing.
[Ambulance siren sounds]
You can smell great barbecue, even before we pull in,
and the owner is right at the door to greet us,
and my mouth is watering.
- We're very glad to have you all here.
Why don't you all come inside, I'll show you around.
- All right, let's go.
[Laughs]
- This--I love this.
That looks delicious.
- This is the birthplace of the Salt Lick.
It all started right here,
and this was handed down through our family
from generation to generation.
My father would get his meats and a cot,
and all night long cook barbecue.
Over here over the direct heat. We use live oak only.
And then we sauce it all up like that.
And over time, it'll caramelize.
- I'm definitely trying to absorb
as much of his knowledge as possible,
because I've never cooked on a pit like this before.
- Would y'all like to try some?
All: Yes! - [Laughs]
- Oh, my God.
- So this is what we call our family-style.
[Overlapping chatter]
- There's a beef and pork sausage,
and these are Texas beef ribs.
- Oh, my God. - Thank you.
- This is Texas barbecue.
- Yeah, this is gonna be a tough act to follow.
- Really. - Yeah, actually.
- So good.
- This is the best.
As I'm eating this I'm getting more nervous.
How am I supposed to make barbecue that's this good?
Even though I live in Texas, I don't do barbecue that much,
so I'm like sweating balls at this point.
- I hope y'all enjoyed that.
- That was amazing. - Awesome.
- Good. We're gonna stay here tonight and cook,
so come on.
- Scott hops in a Toyota Tundra that is loaded with wood.
I mean, there must be, like,
four trees that he's hauling in this thing.
- Look how much space there is.
- This is a cool truck.
- And we all head over to the barbecue pits.
- This truck is like a boat. - It is.
- Big boy.
- Wow, that's a beauty.
- Below us is Onion Creek, and exact recreations
of the pits that you saw up at the Salt Lick.
When the smoke gets into your eyes,
remember those tears are the last flavor profile
for great barbecue.
[Laughter]
- This is a monster of a barbecue.
We have to cook three proteins, two sides,
and we have to make enough for 300 Texans.
- Good luck. All: Thank you.
- All right. All right, let's do it.
Team.
- Watch the rocks.
- Beverly, unload these, please.
- Sign's up.
- Y'all, we got a little courtesy sign over here
on our RV... - [Laughs]
So, uh, come over and pay attention to it.
- Grayson.
The key to winning this is to make sure that
we get our meat in the smoker first,
before everybody else's, because barbecue's about
something that's moist and delicious and tender,
and with these kinds of cuts of meat
we need to cook it low and slow for a really long time.
- All right. - Okay, perfect.
- Ready to cook? - [Laughs]
Yes, doctor, I am.
Knowing that no matter what happens
in the elimination challenge, I'm not going home
because I have immunity, feels great,
but I'm gonna be pushing myself to redeem my beef skills.
- Why do you think you're here?
- Because the steaks were over-cooked when they went out.
- And I get the medium-well steak.
- I'm sorry about that, chef.
I want to put all that steak business behind me.
- Onions, a nice char, but not, like, burned.
- Okay, 'cause I'm putting 'em direct on ash.
- All right.
- [Bleep] Tell me how to cook.
- Oh, wow, it's hot.
- Malibu, are you wearing a wife-beater?
- I know, it doesn't match my shoes.
Thanks for pointing it out.
- I think you look beautiful. - Oh, thank you.
- He's hilarious. [Laughs]
- I can get at least 25 orders out of this.
200 portions, we got plenty to go.
- We just cut these smaller
for the baked beans. - Exactly.
- The bourbon's almost totally reduced, but I--
- Oh, the bourbon's in there already?
- Yeah. - Oh, you're doing it inside.
Be careful in there with bourbon.
- Oh, yeah, it's flambe-ing, for sure.
[Fire alarm sounds] Uh-oh.
- Oh, we got a fire! - [Laughs]
- [Bleep]!
- That's funny, 'cause I just called that.
I said, "Don't do the bourbon inside."
- You just said that? - [Laughing] Yeah.
- [Bleep]! [Fire alarm sounds]
- It's just alcohol. - How do you stop this thing?
[Fire alarm sounds]
- I feel for Beverly.
She's really book-smart,
but when it comes to common sense,
it just seems like she's missing a few chapters.
[Fire alarm sounds]
- That's annoying.
- Sorry, guys.
- Ooh, garlic looks awesome.
That is how love happens.
- Turn it on the back side, I don't want it to get too hot.
- Well, we have a long time. - Right.
- Paul, talk to me about pork. You want to keep 'em whole
just like this? - Yeah, whole.
- Do you want me to score 'em? - No.
- No, they're thin, right? - Yeah.
- Okay. Paul really is the visionary
behind the flavors of our food.
He's a really great chef, he's come out in the top a lot.
I'm glad he's the leader.
- Just trim the bottom off, cut 'em in half.
- Okay.
- I can tell that the blue team
is making an Asian-style barbecue.
This is Texas, and I don't know
if people are gonna be open to those sorts of ideas.
They're taking a huge risk.
- Hey, who's got the foil brisket?
- You're on the ground.
- Huh? - You're on the ground in there.
- They fell? - Yeah.
- How did that happen? - I don't know.
- It was stable when we put it on.
- This is bull [bleep].
None of us have ever used this kind of smoker before.
I guess we just didn't distribute the weight correctly.
Who knew?
Really?
Oh, my God! - Oh.
- Luckily, our briskets were wrapped in foil,
so we put 'em back in the rack.
That's [bleep] up.
But I'm really worried, because we've lost hours of cook time.
- Really?
What the [bleep]?
- I love cooking beer can chicken.
You take a cold beer, you pop the top,
you put the beer can in the chicken, it's hole.
You're actually using steam from the beer can,
so you're cooking it from all different directions.
- Yup. - It's so tight in there.
- [Bleep], I'm tired.
- You guys all happy where you're at?
Are things nicey-nice on you guys?
- Chris is talking to his chicken.
That's what happens when chefs don't sleep.
- [Laughs]
This morning everybody's kind of looped up.
I can't even explain how you feel
after you work through the night.
It's absolutely insane.
- This is the big daddy of all challenges.
I'm exhausted.
The best way to keep focus
is just to put your head down and keep cooking.
♪ Beer can chicken on an open pit ♪
- Been in front of these barbecue pits all night,
then once the sun comes up,
it just magnifies the intensity of the heat,
so it feels like we're sitting on the surface of the sun.
- Almost.
- [Mumbles] - Almost.
- It's good luck, isn't it?
- Hey, chefs. Uh--
so what do you have going on here?
I know, ribs and chicken, but what's going on with the--
- Uh, we actually did a beer can chicken.
I don't know if you've ever done a beer can chicken.
- I've seen it, so there's a beer can up there?
Who's gonna put their name on this chicken right here?
- I definitely wanted to do the beer can.
You know, chicken's such a hard item to cook
that we wanted to keep it as moist as possible.
- And how about the ribs?
What's in the sauce? What's in the glaze?
- It's a Dr. Pepper and coffee glaze.
- Okay.
Well, it sounds like you have a plan.
- Thank you very much. - Good luck.
- Thank you. - Thank you, chef.
- Hi, chefs. - Hey, Tom, how are you doing?
- So why is this team winning? - [Laughs]
- We have Texas, Kentucky, and Kansas City here, so--
- That's are all good barbecue places, too.
So you're responsible for the chicken, Texas-style.
- I'm responsible for the chicken.
- So what do you have on the chicken?
- The sauce is my sweeter Texas-style sauce.
- Got it.
- I'm doing the ribs Kansas City-style.
- Okay. - Dry rubbed,
a spicy barbecue.
- And then brisket Kentucky-style?
- You know, in Owensboro,
they do something called, like, a mop sauce.
It's a little more looser, a little more vinegar-y.
Played off that a little bit. - Okay.
Well, I'm looking forward to it, it looks good.
- Thank you, chef. - Good luck.
- Thank you, chef.
You guys got some water for me?
- Hi, chefs.
- How's it going, Tom? - Good.
What's going on here?
- A lot. - Uh, a lot of--a lot of meat.
- Looks pretty awesome.
So what did you do to the chicken?
- Chicken and the spare ribs, we made a brine
with orange and actually a little fish sauce.
- Okay. - And there's a rub that has
some yellow curry to it. - Okay.
So we're going more Asian barbecue.
Who's idea was that?
- Paul. - Mine.
- Okay.
So you guys haven't slept at all?
- No. - Uh, no.
- Awesome. - [Laughs]
- It's not that awesome. I'm not gonna lie. [Laughs]
I'm so exhausted, and when I get really tired
I say whatever comes to my mind.
No, but you're gonna love it.
- I hope so.
- It's gonna be like sex in the mouth.
- Oh.
[Laughter] - No, really, you're--
- We put a lot of love--
- Cool. All right.
- Thank you, chef. - Thanks, chef.
- Where do you come up with these things, Grayson?
"It's like sex in the mouth."
- Yeah, I know, right? God!
What a dummy.
It's no sleep. That'll do it.
- Listen, I know you've been working your tails off,
you stayed up all night long.
To sweeten the deal a little bit, the winning team...
Will get $15,000.
- Ho! [Applause and whistling]
- We're all at that brink of just exhaustion,
and that kind of prize re-ignites us a little bit more.
- A lot on the line here. One person will go home,
but know there's a lot of pride going on here.
Good luck. [Applause and whistling]
- Wow.
- Winner, winner, chicken dinner.
- I would like to say, that's effing delicious.
- [Bleep]!
Hu-wa! Hu-wa! - [Laughs]
- These ones tasted great over here.
- I think they both need just a little bit more time.
It's like an hour away.
- The dish I'm most worried about
is probably the pork spare ribs.
It was a little salty.
Just don't get it into the end, though.
Maybe we can cut the end pieces off that are a little salty,
and put a little more sauce on it.
Hopefully this works.
- How's the fire still?
- Low.
But it's good enough to hold everything hot.
- Lindsay has a problem cooking the brussel sprouts,
just because our fire is low at this point.
There's not that much more time to start it up again.
I wish that we had more time to make sure that they're cooked.
- Ugh.
[Sighing] Okay.
It's probably 100 degrees, and the pit is a monster.
- Breathing in heavy smoke constantly is hard.
Oh.
Hey, guys. - Hey.
- I need a medic.
I'm feeling a little-- - yeah, we got it.
- Is Sarah okay?
- Hold it up to your face, okay?
[Oxygen flows]
- I started getting hot and cold chills.
And feeling light-headed. - Just give it time.
What day of the week it is?
Fair enough, okay. What month is it?
- Just breathe. It's gonna be okay.
Okay?
- Sarah's, like, having an attack.
They're calling 911. - Nuh-uh.
[Siren sounds]
- I didn't come this far to not compete.
- I understand that, but this doesn't mean that it's the end.
- [Sobbing] I'm so sorry. - Honey, let it go.
Me and Ed got this [bleep].
This is real deal, no joke--
I want you to concentrate on getting better, okay?
Sarah's very upset, and I understand
exactly how concerting it would be to have to leave.
It puts you at a real risk for going home.
- One, two, three.
- Hey, mama, we love you. You're fine.
[Overlapping chatter]
- You guys are on your own.
- Is she okay? I mean, what's wrong? Is she dead?
I'm pissed off.
- Is there water in here? I really need it.
- You guys got a second?
Sarah's pretty much, uh-- the heat got to her
and they had to take her to the hospital.
You guys are on your own. You guys are okay with that?
Both: Yes, sir. - I mean, no choice.
- Okay. - Let's do it.
Obviously the first thing we both think is,
"Well, is she okay? I mean, what's wrong, is she dead?"
I don't know, if it was me, I would have pushed through it.
- It's you and me.
Wow, we're really gonna have to bust some ass.
Me and Ed whip out our knives and start carving up that meat.
- [Bleep]!
Hoo-ah.
Phew.
This really [bleep] sucks.
We were gonna cut our meats to order.
There's no way we can do that with a two-man team.
Now we're just balls-to-the-wall frantic,
trying to just chop our meats and get 'em into hotel pans,
so at least we can have something to serve.
- What do we have to do to finish the beans?
- Beans. Oh, [bleep] me.
- I'm gonna do these last three things of ribs,
we're gonna pack everything up and go.
[Sighs]
- Mother. [Bleep]!
[Lids clatter]
I'm just kicking into "Oh, my [bleep]" mode.
Once you pre-cut meat and put it in that steam table,
you've killed it. Basically,
you're doing the opposite of barbecue,
which is you're steaming meat,
and barbecue is smoking meat,
but it's either that or don't have food to serve at all.
- Showtime.
- We have a lot of Asian flavors, actually.
- I've never had Asian barbecue.
- You probably won't even really know it,
you'll just think it's really delicious.
When service starts, it is a bum-rush.
The line is like 100 people long.
We're just, like, banging out food on the assembly line.
- You can't get by with a fork and a knife,
you have to get into it. That's how you eat barbecue.
- Chicken? Brisket?
- Uh, let's try chicken. - Okay.
We're slicing, we're serving,
and I just go into sheer adrenaline.
This is us showcasing what we did,
this should be the fun part,
it's like a nunchuck rib.
It's like... [Kung-fu noises].
- It's a busy one today.
Me and Ed are serving 300 people,
and we have seven items to put on a plate.
We have 2,100 plate strokes to make and only four hands.
- Homemade pickles, baked beans, and coleslaw.
- Thank you.
- I am moving so fast, I don't even know what to do.
[Slow rock music]
♪ ♪
- ♪ don't look back, don't look back ♪
♪ he's right on your trail ♪
- ♪ don't look back, don't look back ♪
♪ don't look back, don't look back ♪
- Let's go to the bar and get some drinks.
- ♪ Don't look back ♪
- Well, cheers. - Cheers.
- Let's go get some barbecue.
- ♪ No! ♪
♪ ♪
[Cheers and applause]
- Thank you.
- This is a watermelon lemonade, like an agua fresca.
We juiced all the watermelon this morning.
- What do you think? - I like that.
- I love your shirt, by the way.
- Thank you kindly. I've gotten mixed reviews.
90% like, the 10% which are vegans,
they're like, "uh, I don't know,
"I'm kind of a little nervous about you." [Laughs]
- Hi, guys.
- Fine, how are you? - Hi.
- We tried to be different, so we did the Asian spare ribs,
chicken rib, and brisket.
We charred some brussel sprouts and some okra.
It's kind of kimchi flavored.
- And what is this watermelon salad?
- Watermelon with fish sauce, so...
- Good? - I thought it'd be a nice,
refreshing treat, since it's so hot outside.
I think our barbecue's kind of out there,
so it's pretty nerve-wracking to have Nathan be our judge.
- Enjoy, thank you. - Thank you.
- Shall we try the chicken first?
- Mmm. My chicken's delicious.
Sticky and sweet, spicy.
- This is not very smoky, but it's very good-tasting.
- Blue team's ribs I think are really great,
'cause they're smoky and tangy,
- brisket's under-seasoned, I think.
- The brussel sprouts, they needed to cook.
They're usually, "put a fork in it, it's done."
You can't get a fork in it, it's not done.
- Brussel sprouts?
- I've never had cilantro and watermelon before,
but I will in the future. That was great.
- Unbelievable.
[General chatter]
- Hi, guys.
- Hi, how are you?
- We went three styles of barbecue.
There's a beer can chicken. Brisket was done in the smoker,
dry-rubbed, and we did it with a spicy barbecue sauce,
and the pork rib was done on the edges of the pit,
just like you did.
We glazed it with Dr. Pepper barbecue sauce.
- Enjoy the barbecue today. Cheers.
- All right.
- All right, open for business again?
- Let's do it.
- The chicken was really good.
It was perfectly cooked.
- That's a really good roast chicken.
I'm not sure I'd call it a barbecue chicken.
- You know, it has a lot of flavor.
It's really moist,
very little smoke. Almost none at all.
- Your chicken and brisket. - Chicken and brisket? Wait.
- Beans aren't cooked.
- They're too crunchy. They needed a little more time.
- Does anybody find the white team's ribs are really salty?
I was gonna say it's like a Salt Lick,
but I probably shouldn't say that.
[Laughter]
- And the white team's barbecue sauce was out of this world.
- Yeah, and I like their coleslaw.
- The white's-- the white team's coleslaw.
- I thought they were very good.
- Let's move on to the brisket.
- It was really chewy.
- It's juicy, that's the good news.
- I think it needs just a little bit of love.
- I think they did a really good job with their coleslaw.
- I like the white team's coleslaw, too,
because I'm not a mayonnaise fan in coleslaw.
- You know what would make this drink just a little bit better?
- Alcohol. - A nice shot of gin.
- [Laughs] - I was gonna say Tequila.
- Bit your tongue, Canadian.
- I know, I'm so transparent.
- My blood pressure and my heart rate came down,
and I think I'm gonna be okay.
I really want to finish helping the team.
All right, where can I jump in?
- Um-- - hey.
- Hi. - How are you doing?
- I'm okay. - You're okay?
- All of a sudden, here comes Sarah, trucking back to help us.
- Is the breast juicy? - Yeah.
The only thing she's worried about is her chicken.
- Why don't we switch the chicken here,
and I can serve the chicken, and then do the--
- no, no, no, no, we're got 'em--we got--we got it, please.
Let's just go. Even though we were
down one person,
we kind of developed a system.
- Hi, how are you? - We're good.
- Jesus Christ, we can do faster without her.
- This is a brutal service.
- Give me your five best right here, I'm gonna serve those.
- Okay? Give me your five best right in this corner, and I'm--
- I understand what you're saying to me.
Edward is being really rude and mean,
and I'm sure that he is frustrated with the situation,
but it's not something malicious, that I thought,
"hey, let me really screw my team, and get real sick."
At the end of the day, it is what it is, and--
- no, I got you.
- It's not Sarah's fault that she got over-heated.
It was extremely hot out there.
It could have been any one of us.
Just let me know exactly what you want,
and that's exactly what I'll do.
- Hi, guys. - Hi, how are you doing?
- Good. - How are you holding up, Sarah?
- I'm good. [Laughs] - You're all right?
- Yes. - All right.
- I made the Texas-style chicken,
slow and low on the grill, and then baste it
with a tomato-y sauce with a little spice.
- I'm from Kansas City, so I did dry-rubbed
Kansas City-style pork ribs,
and a typical Kansas City-style sauce to go with that.
- And I did a brisket.
I did a salt and pepper rub on it, and then I smoked it.
- We made a big pot of pinto beans
with a lot of bacon in them,
and then we made a summer slaw,
and of course we have to serve it
with a slice of white sandwich bread.
[Laughs]
- Thank you so much, guys. Have a great day.
- So I'm gonna just finish cutting this,
and then I'm gonna go sit down, okay?
- Okay. - The judges have their food,
and I start to get a little bit over-heated again,
so need to go rest and drink some more water,
- and I have no guilty feelings about it.
- Hey, hot pants, it's you and me.
- Again, huh? - Yeah.
- You like how she came back just in time to plate hers,
and then leave again?
- The red team did a good job. - What?
- The chicken's really tender.
- The red team chicken is well-cooked,
'cause it's flavorful.
- It's prepared well-- I mean, it's very moist.
I enjoyed the red team's barbecue sauce.
I think that's what the white bread was for,
as a matter of fact. - [Laughs]
- That's what it's for! - It's really good.
- I like the flavor in Ty's rib,
but the rib texture itself, it's still chewy.
- The flavor profile of the Kansas City sauce is good.
- Out of all the briskets,
the red team had the best flavor.
- I agree.
- They might have sliced it very early.
- It's an excellent point, you know,
all of the great barbecue places carve to order, for a reason.
- The barbecue sauce is very, very good, yeah.
- Do you mind if I try a little bit?
- No, go ahead.
- Really salty. - Very salty?
I don't think it's salty.
- They really knocked it out of the park...
[Laughter] ...With the white bread.
- Good job, buddy. - Good service.
- Let's get out of here.
[Country music]
- ♪ You never seem to look up any more ♪
- Good team work. - Yay!
Big grease ball hug. [Laughs]
- This was not an easy challenge.
I mean, they haven't slept in going on 40 hours at this point.
- I think what they're all gonna learn today,
there's a lot more to barbecue
than just slapping a bunch of meat on a grill
and putting some spices on it.
- Thank you so much for having us here, Scott.
- My pleasure. - It was amazing.
- Oh, now that the adrenaline is going down,
I'm starting to get real tir-- - I'm totally--
at the end of service, I feel physically ill.
I'm just exhausted, frustrated, and pissed.
I didn't serve great barbecue. That breaks my heart.
If they don't like our barbecue,
and we have to refurbish it into something--
- Yup, I'll make barbecue stew.
[Laughter]
- Ty has immunity, and Sarah came back just in time
to pick out four nice drumsticks to give to the judges,
so the irony is, if we're at judges' table, I could go home.
Kill me now.
- It would be sacrilege to boil them, but it
would have been leagues better than what you actually did.
- I love camping.
This is how you do it in the wilderness.
- Come on, Linds, focus!
One of my favorite things about camping is my bullfrog song.
It goes...
♪ Mmm, ack, went the little, green frog one day ♪
♪ mmm, ack, went the little, green frog ♪
♪ mmm, ack, went the little, green frog one day ♪
♪ but his eyes wouldn't let him go ♪
♪ mmm, ack, mmm, ack, mmm, ack, ack ♪
[Laughs]
Linds, you're getting giggly, too?
- There was a break down.
I don't know what-- I think it's probably
got to do with exhaustion.
But there were points when I think we all
stopped really communicating.
I, like, worked prep-heavy throughout,
and then when it came time for my chicken,
I felt like it was like--
- that we weren't supporting you?
- I don't know, there was just some weird vibe I was getting,
and I'm not sure--
- don't get emotional.
- I'm just being honest.
- Hello, chefs.
All: Hello.
- We'd like to see the blue team.
Paul, Lindsay, and Grayson. Thank you.
- Lindsay, Grayson, and Paul...
Your team served our favorite barbecue today,
so congratulations. - Thank you.
- Really, nice job.
Everything was really cooked nicely, it was seasoned well.
The chicken-- I want the recipe.
You were the only team who didn't try to be traditional.
The brisket was heads and tails above the other two briskets
we ate today.
- That was our number one priority.
We were like, "we gotta get the brisket in!"
'Cause, I mean, none of us have cooked on a grill like that.
- Well, you figured it out.
[Laughter]
- I mean, we went all in or nothing.
We're so tired.
[Laughter]
- You'll be splitting $15,000, furnished by healthy choice.
- What's the running total now, Paul?
- Uh, 35.
- $35,000. Well done.
- Not bad.
- I fell very proud to be a Texas chef.
And I pull a lot of energy and strength
from knowing that I need to represent.
- Chefs, can you please send back the other two teams?
[Door creaks open]
- Um, the judges would like to see
the white team and the red team.
- Congratulations, guys. - Congratulations.
- Thank you. - Thanks.
- Thanks, big man.
- Red team and white team,
you served our least-favorite barbecue today.
- Let's start with you, Sarah.
- The problem that we have with the chicken,
although it was moist, it was more like grilled chicken,
not like barbecue chicken.
It didn't have a lot of smoke flavor at all.
- I wish I would have taken a risk,
and probably thrown those chickens in the smoker.
- Some of it was a little bit rubbery,
and just had not been cooked down.
- Yeah.
- I think it's actually safer to make sure
that you've got the skin cooked
before you start slathering it with sauce,
'cause once you put the sauce on,
there's no way you're gonna crisp the skin up.
- Just starts to burn, yeah, especially the sugar in it.
- Ty, how are you feeling right now?
- Pretty bad.
- I love a Kansas City rib,
like, for sure, that's where my heart lies.
Sorry, Texas.
But, you know, there was just--
it was really heavy-handed in the seasoning,
and then just didn't come off that bone.
- It would be sacrilege to boil 'em,
but if you'd had that sauce
on boiled ribs that weren't salty,
it would have been leagues better
than what you actually did.
- Who did what on the coleslaw?
- Um, I shaved all the cabbage.
- I pretty much did the pickle for the haricot vert.
- I kept tasting this kind of very spearminty,
or, you know, unusual mint flavor.
- It was orange mint.
- That explains it.
- It may actually have started to ferment.
It was definitely strange.
- Let's talk about the brisket.
- There was a lot of problems with the brisket.
I think, put it into the steam table too long,
and it starts to steam, and it starts to turn grey and rubbery.
- When you slice brisket, it loses a lot of juice
really fast, so you didn't do yourself a favor
by pre-slicing it that way.
- Unfortunately, there was a point
where we were down one person,
and I just-- there was nothing--
we were just furiously trying to slice and dice stuff.
- Why didn't you--why didn't you still say, "you know what,
I'm still gonna do this brisket pretty much to order?
- We got screwed,
'cause we didn't want a long line of people.
- But I'm not sure at what point things didn't go right for us,
but I wish I would have been able to be there
to help them set up the service line.
- Let's move on to the white team.
- Nathan, what did you think of Beverly's coleslaw?
- I thought that it was okay.
- Mm-hmm. - I didn't think
it was spectacular.
I have a bias towards an acidic coleslaw
to cut the richness of the barbecue.
I think that's it's whole function in the meal.
- Mm-hmm.
- My only issue is, I wish it had been a little more original.
Because you chose to really do such a traditional coleslaw,
it didn't really show us anything of
who you guys are as chefs.
- Did you also cook the chicken?
- I brined it. - And then what happened?
- I cooked all the proteins.
- It was grilled chicken.
- Out of the three ways you could add flavor,
you kind of were very conservative with all of them,
so it was a very, you know,
French grandmother's roast chicken,
more than it was a Texas barbecue or anyone's.
- Who was responsible for the ribs?
- I cooked the ribs.
- And no one else had a hand in the ribs at all?
- I did both the rubs for the brisket and the rib.
I did both the sauces.
- Why did you decide to do a Dr. Pepper sauce?
- 'Cause it's from Texas, you know?
- I don't know, it just seems like
since we've been here, everyone drinks Dr. Pepper.
I don't know.
- The ribs were so salty, it was really inedible.
I don't know what happened there,
if the dry marinade was just, you know,
sitting on one particular area way too long,
but it was really, really salty.
- And who did the beans? - It was me. [Chuckles]
- I thought the beans were undercooked.
You have to cook those beans from the beginning,
cook them all the way through.
They're not gonna continue really cook that much
once you start baking them.
- Thank you.
To be honest, both these teams failed on all their proteins.
Chris Jones was responsible for all the protein.
He manned that grill. He took responsibility for it.
- No, actually, I would say it's just the opposite.
It's the middle Chris.
He made all of the dry rubs and made 'em too salty.
- Was it the saltiness of the rub,
or was it the length of time and the amount
that was put on the rub?
Because that was done by two different people.
- It could've been either one,
but I would say it was the amount of salt.
- Beverly did bad beans
that were also inedible.
- They were undercooked.
You know, unfortunately, Tyler has immunity,
so he's not going home, and he was the one
responsible for a lot of the problems on that team,
and I wish we could send him home.
- The really bad coleslaw from the red team
was a joint effort of Ed and Ty.
And Ed made the bad brisket.
Not inedible brisket, but not very good brisket.
- Lot of problems with that.
Cut it too far in advance. It started to steam.
It was tough, and so, you know,
he did two things wrong.
- I thought Sarah's chicken was better
than the white team's chicken.
- I don't think by a big margin.
- No. - I mean, that's--
- That's a good way to look at it.
- You know, I think we could send someone home
from either team today.
- Sure.
[Suspenseful music]
♪ ♪
- Chefs, tonight's challenge was to come here to Salt Lick
and put together a great barbecue meal.
And I know the difficulties in it.
And you stayed up all night long.
I can appreciate how tired you are right now.
But there were mistakes made, and they need to be addressed.
Sarah, you gave us a pretty good chicken,
but your skin was kind of rubbery.
Ed, you gave us a brisket
that was steamed at a steam table.
Wasn't cooked enough.
Ty, you have immunity, or your fate might be
very different tonight as well.
Chris, you manned the grill.
Most of the grilling just missed the mark.
Not good enough.
Chris, you made the marinade,
the over-salted marinade
that really made those ribs inedible,
which I think was a big mistake.
Beverly, you can't just sit back there
and not have a point of view,
or else what's the point of even being here?
You gotta compete hard and hard all the time.
Well, this was a tough one.
With the exception of Tyler,
any one of you could've easily gone home.
- Chris...
C...
Please pack your knives and go.
- Thank you for the amazing experience,
opportunity of a lifetime.
It was an honor.
- Thank you. Good luck to you, Chris.
- Thank you.
- Malibu.
- You know, it's the right decision.
- It was salty beyond belief.
There's nothing anyone could've done about it
to save it.
[Door opens]
- Looks like Malibu's going back to California.
- No! Aww!
That sucks.
- You know, not stepping up in the group
and taking charge is a big regret for me.
Maybe I was playing a little too safe,
and they're trying to weed out the weakest links.
- Bye, big man. Bye. See you again.
Oh, we're gonna miss our beautiful person.
- I've definitely become more comfortable in my style
and not so caught up in what everyone else thinks.
It was a great experience,
and the sky's the limit now.
- Tonight on Last Chance Kitchen...
To win a spot back on Top Chef,
Malibu Chris will have to use more than his looks...
- Tell me there's baloney in there.
- Pickle. - Oh!
- As he battles Nyesha and her ferocious appetite
for redemption.
To watch Last Chance Kitchen,
go to bravotv.com now.
Next on Top Chef...
- We've been waiting for this, and pretty sure it's here.
- It's restaurant wars. - Whoo!
- It's gonna be boys and girls
fighting it out on the playground.
- Go, go, go, go, go!
Into the void, here we go.
- When you see a server, can you come back
and give me a table number on this.
- Where are the mushrooms?
- Oh, [bleep].
We forgot the mushrooms on the salmon.
- [Bleep] Nightmare.
- Welcome to Half Bushel.
- We're trying to simplify our dishes, Grayson.
- Maybe if you'd ask in a different [bleep] way.
- Beverly, I've already gotten complaints
that the fish is dry.
- I have a feeling that there are heads
being beaten against a wall in the back.
- The judges are [bleep] pissed.
- You know, Lindsay, I'll go out there and face 'em
if you need me to.
We're working as fast as we can.
- I expected alot more.
== sync by elderman ==